Tuesday, April 12, 2016

Calvin Trillin's Poem found offensive


Have they run out of provinces yet?

If they haven’t, we’ve reason to fret.

Long ago, there was just Cantonese.

(Long ago, we were easy to please.)

But then food from Szechuan came our way,

Making Cantonese strictly passé.

Szechuanese was the song that we sung,

Though the ma po could burn through your tongue.

Then when Shanghainese got in the loop

We slurped dumplings whose insides were soup.

Then Hunan, the birth province of Mao,

Came along with its own style of chow.

So we thought we were finished, and then

A new province arrived: Fukien.

Then respect was a fraction of meagre

For those eaters who’d not eaten Uighur.

And then Xi’an from Shaanxi gained fame,

Plus some others—too many to name.


Now, as each brand-new province appears,

It brings tension, increasing our fears:

Could a place we extolled as a find

Be revealed as one province behind?

So we sometimes do miss, I confess,

Simple days of chow mein but no stress,

When we never were faced with the threat

Of more provinces we hadn’t met.

Is there one tucked away near Tibet?

Have they run out of provinces yet?


(Link to offended party.)

19 comments:

Methadras said...

Is this about sucky sucky fi dolla make u lucky pr0n?

edutcher said...

Well, it is Slate.

Sense of humor and a little imagination are endangered species on the Left.

Rabel said...

I read the linked article and I can report that I'm a lot stupider than I was 5 minutes ago. Not saying much, I know.

Amartel said...

I'm shattered by this doggerel. Like, OMG, literally. Stunned and amazed, surprised and outraged. I gotta lie down and type out many paragraphs about how the meter is inferior and the satire is soooo not this second. IT'S IMPORTANT.
Humorless kents have feelings, too. So many feelings.

ricpic said...

I like the idea of Chinese food.
I like the idea of pizza.
Then I succumb to the fantasy mood.
Truth? It's more "meh" than feasta.

ndspinelli said...

Calvin Trillin was considered quite liberal back in his hay days of the 70's/80's and certainly has taken his shots @ W. He is from KC, and is a lover of all types of food. He is not a snob by any means when it comes to food. He loves greasy spoons, pizza, shack's w/ good BBQ, and sketchy Chinese restaurants. However, I don't know if he passes the Goebbel's "class" litmus test and likes Big Mac's. He does LOVE burgers and says Winstead's in KC, a locally owned basic burger and shake restaurant, is one of his favorite restaurants in the world.

ricpic said...

...I'm a lot stupider than I was 5 minutes ago. Not saying much, I know.

You've always been stupid, Rabel,
You always will be stupid;
Look at it this way - what the hell -
Brains don't mean poop to cupid.




Okay, Rabel, I know you have a sense of humor. Please have a sense of humor. Because the poem, Rabel, the poem HAD to be written. :^/

deborah said...

Amartel, thanks for caring enough to write that out. I was too despondent to try, and it wouldn't have approached yours :)

ricpic said...

Calvin's "crime" is that he's too old to make adjustments to the horrible PC prison camp coming down.

Amartel said...

Sounds like Calvin Trillin was the Anthony Bourdain of his day.

ndspinelli said...

Amartel, Good comparison w/ Bourdain.

Trooper York said...

I read about chinks
followed the links
It made me think
It kinda stinks.

rhhardin said...

Trillin's _Runestruck_ was good.

Also he is the author of the chicken story.

Often when friends visit I take them to see the tic-tac-toe playing chicken in Chinatown.

They usually look over the situation and say, "The chicken always gets to go first."

I say, "Yes but he's a chicken. You're a human being. Surely he deserves some advantage."

Later they usually say, "The chicken plays every day. I haven't played for years."

Rabel said...

ric showed us his strength
in iambic pentameter,
but he hasn't has my length
nor my diameter.

:)

ricpic said...

Touche.

Chip Ahoy said...

Hey, Red Chinese Communist Party Guy, wanna hear a poem about Chinese food?

Okay, shoot.

Reads poem.

Ha ha ha ha ha ha, you so funny. That's a good one. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha, make joke about broad expanse of Chinese cuisine, ha ha ha ha ha, confusing to American, ha ha ha ha ha ha, you guys crack me up. Dumplings with soup inside ha ha ha ha that's a good one. Oh man, now you got me hungry for dim sum, let's go get some dim sum, ha ha ha ha many varieties at one time, ha ha ha ha ha ha, very confusing ha ha ha ha ha you guys crack me up.

He liked the joke poem. It rhymes!

It would make a great pop-up book. Each table and setup and texture and textile and plates and service and linen and extra colors, flowers, what have you, will have to be entirely different, each page completely different, except all Chinese.

ampersand said...

Calvin Trillin must still be a good liberal as he is defended in the last paragraph. It is you white people who he is actually mocking. So check your privilege along with your high hat.

rcocean said...

Trilling in reality is a commie asshole. If he's getting blowback - I'm all for it. He'd be the first one screaming "racist" if a conservative had written it.

virgil xenophon said...

@rcocean/

THIS^^^^^!!!!!!